Southern Copper, Peru Workers Wage Talks Collapse
2007-09-17 17:46 (New York)
By Alex Emery
Sept. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Workers at Southern Copper Corp.'s
operations in Peru will vote this week on whether to strike
after failing to reach an agreement on wage increases, a union
official said.
The vote by workers at the company's Ilo smelter and the
Cuajone and Toquepala mines will be held Sept. 19 and 20,
smelter union General Secretary Arnaldo Oviedo said today in a
phone interview.
``Talks have failed and a strike appears practically
inevitable,'' Oviedo said. ``The company has kicked over the
chessboard.'' Alberto Giles, a spokesman for Phoenix-based
Southern Copper, the world's fifth-largest producer of the
metal, declined to comment.
Strikes have cut copper output in Peru, Chile and Mexico,
helping to spur a 19 percent rally in prices this year. Workers
at three of Southern Copper's mines in Mexico have been on
strike since July 30, and contract workers at Chile's Codelco,
the world's biggest copper producer, ended a five-week walkout
on Aug. 1.
Copper futures for December delivery rose 2.75 cents, or
0.8 percent, to $3.42 a pound on the Comex division of the New
York Mercantile Exchange.
Southern Copper fell $1.01, or 0.9 percent, to $109.16 in
New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares have more
than doubled this year. Southern Copper is controlled by Grupo
Mexico SAB, Mexico's biggest mining company.
--Editor: Stroth (kjo/dje/shf). |
